


There's Something Underneath My Bed

by HolleringHawk65



Series: Always a Girl Damian [6]
Category: Batman (All Media types)
Genre: F/M, always a girl Damian, family stuff, i attempted domestic fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-14
Updated: 2015-11-14
Packaged: 2018-05-01 13:03:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,037
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5206904
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HolleringHawk65/pseuds/HolleringHawk65
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Adopting kids is looking like a Wayne family tradition.</p>
            </blockquote>





	There's Something Underneath My Bed

**Author's Note:**

> I've wanted to do this for a while and I originally intended it one way and then it turned out like this so I hope you enjoy this :)

“I don’t want us to have kids,” Jason had said one day, over breakfast. “I mean, like, biologically.”

Dami had set her cup of coffee down, arched an eyebrow over her newspaper. “Surrogate then?”

His cheeks had turned pink. “No, I mean. I want to adopt. And I figured that maybe, since we’ve been a couple for a long, long time, that maybe-”

“You want to adopt… now?” And that was scarier than anything she’d faced alone, or even with a team, in the field. Because, sure, she was almost twenty-one now and she could kind of take care of people but… “Are you sure?”

He sighed. “I’m sorry. It was stupid to bring up, but with my _injuries_...” they hadn’t healed correctly and any attempts of fixing it just caused him more pain then he was in day to day. Bruce and Damian had both drawn the line, both barred Jason from going out. And maybe, in another life, he would have just bypassed them, but he was happy, right now, and he didn’t want to mess that up. “...i’m here a lot, and all I do is get in Alfred’s way.”

“So you want a child so it can occupy you? Why don’t you just get a dog?”

“I want to help a kid like Bruce helped me and Dick. Minus the whole dying thing, of course.”

She sighed before glancing at her watch. “I have-”

“The meeting with the shareholders. I know, it was a bad morning to bring this up.” _A bad idea in general._ “Good luck.”

She leaned over, kissed the top of his forehead. “My beloved,” she whispered before pulling away.

“Love you, too.”

\---

If he was being quite honest with himself, which he rarely was, he had no idea what he was doing in Crime Alley on a Tuesday night in late winter. He knew that soon bats and birds would be flying around on patrol, that someone would see him and go “Isn’t it past your bedtime?”

(At the very least, he stayed up for the 11 o’clock news, thank you very much.)

Maybe, subconsciously, he did know what he was doing there, even just a little. So when he cycled back to his bike, he wasn’t surprised that someone was _there_. What did surprise was that _someone was huddling behind it for warmth_. Without thinking, he closed the distance and scooped them up, only to find that it was a little girl with large eyes, looking like she was about to cry.

“I know karate!” she said as she squirmed in his arms. Instead of laughing, like some people might, he set her down, because he’d been in these kind of situations before, when he thought he was done for. She looked at him, scrunching up her face. “Ain’t you that guy who just got married? The kid who got out of Crime Alley?”

“They calling me that now?”

“Nah, not really, but I read something that said that.” She straightened up, brushed herself off. “What’s a respectable guy like you doing here, Mr. Jason Wayne - Todd - al Ghul?” She scrunched up her face again, as if the length of his last name caused her a migraine.

He still didn’t know himself so he said: “Walking. What’s a little girl like _you _doing here, Miss…?”__

“Miss Charlotte Noctem.” She cleared her throat and, in the best deep voice a seven year old could muster, said: “I am the night!” Jason had to smile at her effort. “Anyway, my friends just call me Charlie, but please don’t. First of all, I don’t know if you’re a friend and secondly, I hate it.” 

“I’ll remember that.” He stayed still, watching her. “You need a warm place to go to tonight?”

Dark eyes looked up at him. “You’re _not_ taking me to a Wayne Shelter.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it.”

\---

Damian looked in their bedroom to say good night to Jason before she went on patrol, but there room was empty. Normally, she wouldn’t worry, but Jason hadn’t said anything about going out, even though his bike was gone and she hadn’t seen him since lunch.

“Alfred!” She ran down the stairs to the kitchen to where the butler was. “Have you seen Jason?” 

“Damian,” Talia admonished as she appeared. “Don’t act so crudely.” 

Her eyes narrowed before she clicked her tongue and stalked off towards the cave. Jason was probably fine.

\---

“Master Jason…?” Alfred started as he saw the man come in, a little girl in his arms. “I thought you and Miss Damian were still deciding on…”

“And this girl would have frozen to death,” Jason snapped, “Because she would have been overlooked at a homeless shelter, or she would have been attacked, or… I’m not going to let that happen if I have a chance to stop it.” He shifted the girl in his arms before whispering: “I’m sorry, Alfred.”

“Quite fine, Master Jason. Is there anything I can do to help you and the young miss?”

“I’m going to go warm her up, would you mind making a pot of hot chocolate?”

“Not in the slightest.”

“Thanks, Alfred.”

\---

Charlotte woke up on top of a bed in a warm room. There was a moment of panic within her for a moment, forcing her to take a deep breath and gathering her wits. She sat up and saw that there were pajamas--a little worn and looked like they’d be a bit big on her, but they were red plaid flannel bottoms and a matching dark green shirt with a gingerbread on it. “Hey, Jason? Are you still there?”

He’d left the lights on in the bedroom, so she wondered if he was coming back soon, but after a few minutes, he hadn’t. She slowly got up, grabbing the clothes and walking into the adjacent bathroom. The bathroom was _humongous_ , easily the same size as any of the places she had lived in before in _total._ She quickly got changed before going back into the bedroom, slipping on a pair of moccasin slippers that she saw lying on the floor.

She went out into the hallway, wondering where Jason could be. She figured that her best bet would be downstairs, maybe in the direction of cooking food, so she went there.

A few minutes later, she found Jason, cookie in hand, and an older man with a cup of tea standing by the counter. The older man noticed her first and smiled, like a grandfather seeing his grandchild. “You must be Charlotte,” he said, revealing a British accent. “Do you like hot chocolate?”

“I prefer coffee, thank you.” Which she only said because she’d never _had_ hot chocolate before. “Um, who are you?”

“My name is Alfred Pennyworth, Wayne family butler, but you can just call me Alfred, little one. Now, about that coffee--I’ve had children addicted to trapezes, cigarettes, taking photos of people at awkward times, and _vegan_ food,” he gave a mock shudder, “But they all enjoyed my hot chocolate, isn’t that right, Jason?”

Jason leaned down a little bit, smiling at her. “It’s Heaven in a cup. You sure you don’t want any? It’s just the right temperature.”

She sniffed the air again before sighing. “Sure, what do I have to lose?”

\---

Damian came home at two o’clock in the morning. Patrol had been successful enough, but all she wanted to do was curl up with Jason and sleep until noon. She had already taken her shower by the time she dragged herself up to their room, and was about to plop herself down on the bed when she realized that it was _still empty_.

She walked back out of their room and scoured the manor, finally finding Jason and _a little girl_ in one of the media centers. There was a plate of crumbs from a batch of Alfred’s M &M cookies, two mugs, and an empty teapot, which had probably held hot chocolate.

Her husband cracked an eye, smiling as he did so. “Hey beautiful.”

“I thought we were going to _talk_ about this,” she hissed, trying to be angry even though he was looking so beautiful like this; so _relaxed_. “ _Jason_.”

“I brought this up _weeks_ ago and I was in Crime Alley and Dami, she was _huddled_ around my bike! I couldn’t leave. I can’t believe you would ask me to have done that!”

“There’s a reason for the Wayne foundation! They help homeless people.”

He stood up, gathering the sleeping girl and her blanket into his arms. “I’m _not_ letting her go back there.”

“Beloved… ” She watched the way that he held the girl, how protective it was. She imagined that Bruce had always looked like that when he carried her, and her heart broke, but in a good way. “If you’re happy, I’m happy. Are you coming to bed after you tuck her in?”

“Yeah,” he smiled at her before walking out.

Dami stood there for a moment before sighing. _I’m drawing the line at three,_ she told herself, because she’d be damned if Jason didn’t let her get a dog.

\---

Jason was with Kori for a weekend getaway. Charlotte was, of course, obviously uncomfortable around everyone except Alfred, so it surprised Dami when she woke up from a night terror--something that _Jason_ would have woken her up from--to find Charlotte standing over her, hands on Dami’s arms, as if she’d been shaking her.

When the girl noticed she was awake, she took her hands off, clearly flustered. “I heard you and…” She shrugged. “I know how you feel. I mean, I never died, but. I know the terror. Do you want me to get you some hot chocolate?”

Dami sat up. Charlotte never, _ever_ talked to her on her own terms, so _this_ was weird. “Did Jason put you up to this?”

“No,” the young girl said, simply. “He’s legally my dad, but he doesn’t get to tell me what to do. I mean, you’re basically my mom and…” She hugged her suddenly, reminding her of herself. “I don’t want you to have bad dreams,” she whispered, “...Mom.”

There was something about the small word that made Dami’s chest bloom into a garden; Jason wasn’t ‘Dad’ or even ‘Father’ to Charlotte--he was just ‘Jason’ or ‘Jay.’ _So this? It felt like a victory._

What felt like even more of a victory is a few weeks later when Jason and Dami were both home, intertwined in their bed, when they heard Charlotte crying out. Jason jerked, reflexes telling him that his daughter (for lack of a better term) needed him, and he _wanted_ to be there. But, Dami put her hand on his chest, keeping him down. “I got this,” she said with a smile before getting up and going to her daughter (for lack of a better term, she told herself).

She got into Lotte’s bed, pulling her into her arms and crooning to her softly in Arabic. It wasn’t something that her mother had ever done, no, Talia had always been cold and distant. The lullaby was something that one of the guards had sung to her whenever she had a nightmare because he was the only one who had ever cared.

So, even though her chest had tightened up the first few times she had done this, now it just made her happy as Charlotte woke up and smiled at her.

“Thank you for chasing the monsters away,” she told her, snuggling closer into Damian. “You do it the best.”

She carded her fingers through her daughter’s hair, earning a sigh as she started drifting off to bed again. “Do you want to come back to bed with me?”

She nodded and the girl, still so light, was picked up into Damian’s arms easily enough to be carried to the next room over. Jason was waiting for them, propped up on an elbow, sleepily smiling at them when they got into the bed.

“My two favorite girls,” he said as he smiled.

And this? This is something that Dami _and_ Jason wanted to protect. They wanted to protect their family, _their daughter_ , and hope that she wouldn’t catch onto their bad luck.

**Author's Note:**

> Feel free to follow me on tumblr! It's the same username :)


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